IBPA Bulletin 479 December 2004
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THE INTERNATIONAL BRIDGE PRESS ASSOCIATION Editor: ..................... JOHN CARRUTHERS This Bulletin is published monthly and circulated to around 400 members of the International Bridge Press Association comprising the world’s leading journalists, authors and editors of news, books and articles about contract bridge, with an estimated readership of some 200 million people BULLETIN who enjoy the most widely played of all card games www.IBPA.com No 481 Year 2005 Date February 10 [email protected] President: PATRICK D JOURDAIN Editorial 8 Felin Wen, Rhiwbina The opinions expressed here are solely those of the Editor, and do not Cardiff CF14 6NW WALES UK (44) 29 2062 8839 necessarily represent those of the IBPA Executive or its members. email: [email protected] As a bridge player, there can be few things more pleasurable than going to a World Chairman: Championship, whether an Olympiad, Bermuda Bowl or Rosenblum. It is such a treat, HENRY G FRANCIS 6875 Stornaway Drive whatever the circumstances of one’s attendance: as a player, a journalist, an organiser, Memphis, TN 38119 USA an official. It is even more fun when the tournament is in a wonderful city such as (1) 901 754 3405 Cell: 901 355 6875 Istanbul and it is exceptionally-well organised, as was the 2004 Olympiad. Most players Email: [email protected] will agree that the single most important factor in a championship is the playing Executive Vice-President: space. Attractive, spacious, well-lighted, comfortable playing areas go a long way to JAN TOBIAS van CLEEFF making participants happy. Such was definitely the case in Istanbul. Other factors are Prinsegracht 28a 2512 GA The Hague, NETHERLANDS the venue itself, the playing schedule, the efficiency of the organisation, eating facilities, (31) 70 360 5902 and so on. Again, Istanbul was first-class in all of these. Email: [email protected] Nevertheless (you knew there had to be a ‘but’), there were areas in which the Olympiad Organizational Vice-President: (and other WBF events as well - this is not a problem peculiar to any one WBF PER E JANNERSTEN Villa Cicero Championship) could have been improved. Some of these (in no particular order) are: SE-774 27 Avesta, SWEDEN o Scoreboards. It is much easier to see the big picture on a scoreboard than it is on a (46) 22 66 1900 scrolling monitor. It is annoying to have to wait a few minutes to see the standings Email: [email protected] you are interested in, then have them disappear before you can digest them. While a Secretary: scoreboard may be difficult to construct for a 130-team Transnational, it is a simple MAUREEN DENNISON 148 Thornbury Road, Osterley matter for a Bermuda Bowl or a 20-team Olympiad section. Before the intrusion of Isleworth TW7 4QE, ENGLAND UK technology, this was de rigueur, and occasionally the old ways are still best. (44) 20 8560 3788 F: 20 8568 3553 o Large, publicly-displayed bracket sheets for the knockout phase, with segment-by- Email: segment scores. Perhaps the teams involved knew who they would play next if they [email protected] won their matches, but the rest of us did not. The ACBL does this particularly well. Membership Secretary: o Easily-readable hand records with Deep Finesse analysis. This is now a fixture at Dr STUART STAVELEY Rhu-na-Bidh, Shieldaig, Strathcarron Australian and American tournaments – why not at the world-level? The actual Ross-shire IV54 8XN SCOTLAND UK hand records in Istanbul were pitiful: one needed the visual acuity of a peregrine (44) 1520 755 217 F: 1520 755 355 falcon to read them. Although I did not measure it, the typeface seemed about 4- Treasurer: point and not very readable. HANS CHRISTER ANDERSSON o Datums for each board. This is another easily-obtainable, but mysteriously-absent Arstagatan 20 C item (and as Ron Klinger pointed out in last month’s issue, hand records, datums, 75434 Uppsala, SWEDEN etc., should also be made available on the WBF web site subsequent to play). (46) 18 253584 O: 18 175764 Email: [email protected] o The Daily Bulletins. Generally, the Bulletins are very good, and there’s scarcely a Honorary General Counsel: player who would think of sitting down to breakfast without them. In the short time WILLIAM J PENCHARZ available to them each day, the editors do a great job. However, I for one would like 50 Broadway, Westminster to see, at least once, the names of all the players on each team. Additionally, I’d like London SW1H 0BL ENGLAND some information on how the knockout opponents are chosen, including bracket (44) 207 222 7000 sheets for future and past matches. There is a middle ground between ACBL Email: [email protected] policy of publishing the name of every player who placed in every section of every Awards Secretary: session of every event and the WBF policy of keeping us in the dark as to who is BARRY J RIGAL Apt 8E, 22 West 26th Street, playing in its premier events. True, everyone knows who is playing for Italy and the New York NY 10010, USA USA, but what about Japan, Morocco and Venezuela? It was weird that in Istanbul, (1) 212 366 4799 the only event for which team members were listed was the Transnational. Finally, Email: [email protected] more timely reporting of the matches would be nice. Other daily bulletins do it, and Sponsored Members’ Secretary: I see no reason why we can’t have the matches played one day reported the next. IRENA CHODOROWSKA UI Sewastopolska 3m41 My email address at Sympatico (my Internet Service Provider) was disabled for two 02-758 Warsaw, POLAND weeks in January due to technical difficulties in their outsourcing the email portion to (48) 842 5054 MSN. If you sent me material or simply an email to which I have not responded, it Email: [email protected] means I have not received it. Please resend it. I have no confidence that my ISP or MSN Bulletin Production Manager: was able to retrieve them all! JEAN TYSON 105 Roundways, Coalpit Heath Address all editorial correspondence to: JOHN CARRUTHERS Bristol BS36 2LT, ENGLAND 65 Tiago Avenue, Toronto, Ontario M4B 2A2, Canada (44) 1454 778432 Tel: +1 416 752 7034 Fax: +1 416 344 4851 Email: [email protected] Email: [email protected] 1 Indian Winter Nationals from Sri Lanka. The latter two fizzled out thereafter to India R.Jayaram, Baroda, India Blues and Railways A respectively, whereas the other two quarterfinals were close affairs, with NALCO and Railways B just managing to reach the semifinals. India Blues continued The Indian Winter National Bridge Championships (WNBC) their good run and easily made the finals at the expense of played in the month of December every year is almost like a Railways B; Railways A, India’s representative team at Istanbul mela (a sacred Hindu pilgrimage, occurring four times every twelve and winner of this event both in 2002 and 2003, were looking years, once at each of four locations in India – Ed.). Nearly 1200 for a hat-trick of wins as they prevailed over NALCO by 21 players from all over the country converge for ten days of IMPs. intensely competitive bridge and great camaraderie. This time around it was held at the Waltair Club in the port city of And, hat-trick it was. The Railwaymen cantered away with a Visakhapatnam in eastern India. The club started functioning 162-108 win in the 64-board finals. The sixsome representing in 1883 and the Britishers’ stamp can be seen all over the the Railways did not stop at that. Seeded directly into the place. It was the British who turned Vizag, short for BAM event finals, they were miserably placed at the end of Visakhapatnam, into a thriving port and even renamed it Session I; staging an almost unbelievable recovery in the Waltair. The city’s most famous landmark is a huge rock next two sessions, they scored over 70% in both these jutting out into the Bay of Bengal, appropriately named sessions, thus scoring a remarkable double. Dolphin’s Nose (photo below - Ed.). The tournament was If ever there was a one-horse race in a major Pairs event, this was it. Probably smarting at such an early exit from the Ruia Trophy, Kiran Nadar and B. Satyanarayana produced dazzling form in the elimination rounds of the Holkar Pairs event to go into the finals with a 60 matchpoint carry over, the equivalent of four boards. They were never in danger of being caught at any stage of the finals and emerged easy winners – their first in this event – literally by a distance. Catch Them Young – I It was Kamal Roy – he finished 10th in the Pairs Olympiad at Albuquerque in 1994 – who brought the following defence to my notice, in which Kamal himself was declaring four hearts. Sukomal Das, barely thirty, was the defender in the West position: sponsored by Navayuga Engineering Company (NEC) whose Dealer South. Both Vul. Chairman, C.V. Rao, is one of the biggest patrons of Indian [ K 9 6 4 bridge. The co-sponsor was the club itself, whose Centenary ] 8 7 5 3 Auditorium served as the Open Room. There was a special {K 6 2 shamiana (a large decorated tent used at a fair or bazaar – Ed.) }K 5 constructed, which served as the Closed Room. The almost [ A Q 8 [ 7 5 2 unanimous feedback from the participants was that, “It was ]A Q 2 ]4 the best-ever organized Indian Nationals.” { Q 5 4 { J 10 9 7 3 One hundred and sixty-one teams, including a team from } 10 9 6 3 } Q 8 4 2 Sri Lanka, entered the teams-of-four event for the Ruia Gold [ J 10 3 Trophy, the Blue Ribbon of Indian bridge.